Retro POY '93-94 (Voting Complete)

[kaima]

I can't see anyway Robinson is ahead of Hakeem. Hakeem was the MVP, Finals MVP, DPOY, All-NBA/All-D 1st. That's like a perfect season award-wise. DRob was 2nd best in everything, and lost in the 1st round with HCA.

He didn't just lose. He was torn up.

[Optimism Prime]

Before I forget!

My "Most Hated/Least Valuable/Utterly Horrendous" POY vote, for which I will be awarding him negative infinity minus two points, goes to OJ Simpson for interrupting the Finals.

This is not open for debate. I'm right and if you disagree with me, you're all wrong. Neener neener.

[ronnymac2]

The difference between the two, for me at least, is this: You can't trust Shaq to make free throws in big games, but you can't depend on Robinson in big games. ronnymac2--was that kind of what you were getting at with your problems with Shaq/DRob?

No. Well, yeah, it is a fact that Shaq can't hit free throws, but that wasn't my problem. It had more to do with his ability to read defenses at this point. Also, I don't like playoff rookies.

ElGee- Good post about Scottie's leadership problem in the NY series. It was still an incredibly stupid thing to do by him, but...it probably shouldn't count against him that much if he played the role of leader all year and played well after the event.


Okay, time to vote....

Final Vote:

Hakeem Olajuwon
Karl Malone
Shaquille O'neal
Charles Barkley
David Robinson


I thought about penalizing Malone for the flu during the WCF, but he still played well, especially on the glass. If Utah had won, I'd be calling him a hero like MJ, who should rival Hakeem this year for playing with the flu. That'd be stupid.

I'll explain the Barkley vote....I don't really care about the games missed. It's 17 games. He was there in the playoffs. His stats were down from the previous season in the REG SEA, but they were still very good. He dominated in the playoffs though. That indicates to me that he is still the same player that I consider prime Charles Barkley. And that's a player I'd take over the remaining players in 1994.

I put Robinson over Ewing, but I just want to reiterate- these last few years have made me question who is better between Ewing and Robinson? Robinson is the better passer, slightly better scorer, and better defender. He's more talented. But Ewing is tough and has the better mentality. What is more important?

I like Ewing a hell of a lot more than Robinson, but Robinson's talent and jaw-dropping numbers barely win out for this year. He's lucky.

Honorable Mention: Patrick Ewing, Scottie Pippen....both had fantastic season. Top 30 players ever, and in this season, they both showed it.

[Dr Positivity]

This is a weird year to judge for me. Hakeem is obviously #1, but all the players after him have warts. I feel like everyone is #4 quality this year and nobody's a legit #2. Going down it...

Karl Malone had a way off year statistically. After 6 straight years of 27-29ppg at .60 TS%, he drops to 25ppg .55 TS%. Even stranger is he did this jumping way up to 40-41mpg. His per 36 average was 22ppg .55 TS% which is for Karl. And the team results showed it. Only 53 wins. He played well in the playoffs but I don't know how much credit I give for beating 8th seed Denver in round 2, similar to the 07 Jazz. Furthermore the Jazz were up 3-0 and let it get to Game 7 surprisingly. With that said he didn't have a clear letdown in the playoffs

David Robinson. Crazy regular season - 30/11/5/3.3/1.7 statline at .58 TS%, with a 30.7 PER. Dropped 71 on the last day. And with DPOY caliber d. Ended up with 55 wins. I'm surprised he didn't win MVP over Hakeem with that great resume though obviously Olajuwon winning ended up the right decision. And then as always the case with Robinson, there's the playoffs. When you have HCA against Utah the game is always to hold your own court. Because needing to win a game in Utah is death. And Robinson failed this game as poorly as you POSSIBLY CAN. He scored 12 points on 2-14 shooting in Game 2 in San Antonio. 2-14. Utah's C was Felton Spencer... he scored 15 on 6 for 9. Felton Spencer outplayed Robinson. Felton Spencer. Robinson's Game 3 was almost as bad. He scored 16 on 8 for 21 shooting on 0 FTAs. Robinson will be tough to make my top 5 because that is simply embarrasing.

Shaq... already dropping 29/13/3 in his 2nd year. But still very young and his first time in the playoffs. His playoffs were decent not great. 24, 15, 23 points, and in games 1 and 3 he played 45 minutes. Per 36 minutes those games adjust to 19.2 and 18.4. That's a pretty weak 3 games for a dominant 30ppg scorer. Furthermore Orlando lost their first 2 home games by 3 points combined. Orlando this year was a classic 'super young stars' team who doesn't have the reps to win yet despite great talent

Barkley, my issues are the missed games and moreso than that, the Rockets series. They won the first two games in Houston and still lost. That's bad. It's like if the Celtics lost to Orlando this year after the first two games. When you go up 2-0 as the road team it should be over. And Barkley deserves blame... Game 3 which turned the series, he shot 9 for 22 and had 0 FTAs. Game 4 he scored 19 points on 7 for 21. Barkley needed to be better.

Pippen. Put up 22/9/5.6 with elite d and carried a surprising Bulls team. Extremely nice year and proof he could do it without Jordan. But I'm still not sure he was as good as these franchise guys.

Ewing had a really solid year. Dropped 24/11/3 with d, the Knicks mostly took care of business on their way to the finals. I still think Ewing's destiny was to do with KG did in 08 as a guy who could still be the best player on a title team, but with at least 1 or 2 legit offensive players who could say "Ok Patrick, we'll take it from here". Or when Lebron started going off against those Celtics, Pierce fought right back. That's what Ewing needed, particularly against Jordan. And even with that he still came within a hair of winning the title. The Knicks took one of the first two games in Houston and then gave away HCA again. Game 6 was a 2pt game. Game 7 was a 6 point game with John Starks' grim reaper game. I'm still not sure about giving Ewing too much credit for winning the East because the Jordan-less Bulls and the Pacers weren't all that great - but in this case it'll probably be enough because almost everyone else screwed up.

My vote:
1. Hakeem Olajuwon
2. Karl Malone
3. Patrick Ewing
4. Scottie Pippen
5. David Robinson

I had a tough time choosing between Drob/Barkley/Shaq all of which I wasn't impressed with in the playoffs, I went with Drob because he had by far the best RS

[ElGee]

Still, his regular season performance on offense was good enough to land him No. 5 over a down season from Karl Malone.

Thing about Malone's down season is that he was still plainly top 5 (fifth in PER, fourth in WS, fifth in PPG) in the regular season, and arguably the second best player in the post-season. He also again demonstrated his underrated post-defense, which stats aren't generally picking up.

Hakeem is obvious. But everybody else ranked had a worse post-season than Malone, with two of the four having horrendous matchup failures to end the season (Ewing, Robinson), and one showing his lack of playoff experience (did Smits bother Shaq? Yes, but it's very difficult to say that Shaq "lost" the matchup).

Basically the only reason Malone didn't crack the top 5 was defense. He was a brutally difficult omission.

[ElGee]

Meanwhile Shaq put up 30-13 and 3 in the regular season. Wins 50 games goes to Indiana, put up 24-20-3-5 and Hardaway, Anderson and Scott combine to shoot something like 20% from the field.
Game 2, Shaq is in foul trouble the whole time, never gets going.
Game 3, puts up decent line, Anderson and Scott do the usual choke job going 7 for 28.

SB - Shaq didn't "go to Indiana." The Magic were swept with HCA. Game 1 was in the Magic Kingdom.

Also, I'm not understanding how "foul trouble" is a good thing. Shaq was 3-8 from the floor and 9-18 from the line. Penny, Scott and Anderson were 23-48 for 64 points.

I'll also add this about Olajuwon - he was the only player I saw throughout this postseason who just continuously made big plays down the stretch of big games. So, he had a great RS, great PS, each series was great, he won H2H matchups, he had big games and he had big moments in big games. Made him an easy No. 1. During Game 5 of the WCF, Dick Enberg kept referring to his big plays as "Who else?" "what else do you expect?" "Good enough?" "What can't he do!?" Easily the most impressive player in 1994.

[Sedale Threatt]

Also, I'm not understanding how "foul trouble" is a good thing.

It's not. Bad calls or not, it's your responsibility to stay out on the court. If you can't, and your production is limited as a result, that's your fault.

[kaima]

Still, his regular season performance on offense was good enough to land him No. 5 over a down season from Karl Malone.

Thing about Malone's down season is that he was still plainly top 5 (fifth in PER, fourth in WS, fifth in PPG) in the regular season, and arguably the second best player in the post-season. He also again demonstrated his underrated post-defense, which stats aren't generally picking up.

Hakeem is obvious. But everybody else ranked had a worse post-season than Malone, with two of the four having horrendous matchup failures to end the season (Ewing, Robinson), and one showing his lack of playoff experience (did Smits bother Shaq? Yes, but it's very difficult to say that Shaq "lost" the matchup).

Basically the only reason Malone didn't crack the top 5 was defense. He was a brutally difficult omission.

My biggest problem with defensive arguments is so often one of measurement. For instance, I think Shawn Kemp was a very underrated lynchpin in Seattle's schemes. But a lot of this is not credited and not traced, so Kemp is not generally considered as an elite defender.

Similarly, Malone was an awesome man defender. For all the talk about Robinson's defense, when it came to the playoff matchup between the two Malone's skillsets actually came up bigger in this area.

He also was what got Utah through a tough Denver team that just stopped Seattle's attack. In that sense, it was an example of dominant offense>dominant defense.

I think my question was just one where, where down season or not, Malone was arguably top 5 in the regular season and top 2-3 in the playoffs. I'm not saying you're wrong in the least, I just had trouble understanding the measurement or standard between seasons.

But hell, I kept questioning portions of my own list as well.

[lorak]

Good team defense >> good man to man defense. Always.
Robinson was great defensive anchor, Malone was very good man to man defender. Significant difference in terms of value for team defense.

[ElGee]

^^If you look at my lists you'll see I regard Malone extremely highly. My efforts to measure defense stems from a combination of film analysis, what I remember and any statistical analysis possible. I agree, Malone was an underrated defender in general. I just think his down offensive season makes him hard to take over my 5 because those 4 guys are literally playing at an all-time level defensively (at least in context of 3-point era NBA play). Shaq is the only guy I would swap him for -- it was a close call, and obviously I could have made the wrong one.

[Doctor MJ]

My vote:

1. Hakeem
2. Malone
3. Robinson
4. Ewing
5. Pippen

2-7 really tough for me.

In the end, I lifted Malone up to 2. i've bought in, at least to some degree, to what he did to Robinson.

Do I totally dismiss Robinson as a choker? No. It's interesting, if you look at the Spurs this year, they got totally torn up by Malone & Barkley. 0-8 combined record in the regular season. So the Spurs didn't really get upset in the playoffs, they lost to a team they always lost to. What does that say about Robinson? Well, the proposed narrative is that he gets hammered by other greats. If that's the case, one would expect his team would do even worse against the other great centers right? Well, that's not the case, did fine against Hakeem/Ewing/Shaq. If Robinson can hold his own against greats at his position, I think he's doing just fine.

Out of curiousity though, I checked out how Malone & Barkley did against the 4 great big men. Turns out they really tore them up. M & B tend to get disrespected relative to these centers because of the defensive impact, but other than Hakeem in this era, they seem to get the best of the others.

Ewing takes spot 4. Him vs Pippen basically comes down to the playoff series with Ewing's Knicks coming out on top. Him vs Shaq? Well, Shaq got stymied and swept by the Pacers, Ewing tore them apart. We know that after this year essentially no one could stop Shaq from putting up big numbers, so I do think that on the biggest stage Ewing was the better player at this point.

Pippen gets the nod for the 5th spot. Hard for me to pick him over Barkley, but it's stunning how well the Bulls did in Year 1 A.J., and he deserves most of the credit for that.

Honorable Mention:

Barkley - an absolute beast. I don't feel comfortable leaving him out of the top 5, but given his relatively weak regular season and missed time, I can't put him ahead of the top 5.

Shaq - His "Durant" year.

KJ - My lord, two beast for Phoenix. Amazing that Hakeem's Rockets were even better.

Reggie - Reggie vs the Knicks began this year. Fantastic stuff.

Payton - Tempted to go with Mutombo here because he clearly was the best player on the court in their series. Gotta remember the whole season though. Had matchups been different, Sonics might have won the title. (Actually first went with Kemp, then switched)

[Doctor MJ]

Last call. Please make clear any changes you make after now.

[ElGee]

I'm going to make a change -- it will be edited in my voting post.

Edit made - Malone over Shaq.

[Silver Bullet]

Changed my vote -

pushed Hakeem from 3 to 1
Robinson from 1 to 2
Shaq from 2 to 3

[Silver Bullet]

I still think Robinson should be clearly above Hakeem and in my eyes he was a far superior player - he got outplayed one series and Hakeem overtook him in the eyes of the public....

At the same time, if everybody is so vehemently opposed to it - I must be doing something wrong.

I remember Robinson being clearly considered the better of the two, at least up until this year - but the MVP voting does not support me.

And I do have to reward Hakeem for an amazing post-season - at the same time, I feel (and again, I'm not backed up in this by the MVP vote) that Robinson was just further ahead and by a fairly decent margin -

[Doctor MJ]

'93-94 Results

Code: Select all

Player             1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th Pts   POY Shares
1. Hakeem Olajuwon  23   1   0   0   0 237   0.988
2. David Robinson    1  12   5   2   4 132   0.538
3. Shaquille O'Neal  0   3   8   6   2  81   0.338
4. Patrick Ewing     0   3   4   7   6  68   0.283
5. Karl Malone       0   5   2   3   6  60   0.250
6. Scottie Pippen    0   0   4   5   6  41   0.171
7. Charles Barkley   0   0   1   1   0   8   0.033


[semi-sentient]

Site updated: http://www.dolem.com/poy

Shaq inches closer to Duncan, but since he only has one more year left, it's highly unlikely that he'll catch him. Malone inches closer to Kobe as well, passing up KG in the process.

Code: Select all

1. Tim Duncan         6.153
2. Shaquille O'Neal   5.910
3. Kobe Bryant        3.658
4. Karl Malone        3.396
5. Kevin Garnett      3.388

[Silver Bullet]

Did I change my vote too late or did someone else put D-Rob at 1 too ?

[Optimism Prime]

Did I change my vote too late or did someone else put D-Rob at 1 too ?

Gongxi did.

[eminence]

Bummed Mutombo didn't get more discussion this year.